Moreover, if certain foods are forbidden to the profane because they are sacred, certain others, on the contrary, are forbidden to persons of a sacred character, because they are profane. Thus it frequently happens that certain animals are specially designated as the food of women; for this reason, they believe that they partake of a feminine nature and that they are consequently profane. On the other hand, the young initiate is submitted to a series of rites of particular severity; to give him the virtues which will enable him to enter into the world of sacred things, from which he had up till then been excluded, they centre an exceptionally powerful group of religious forces upon him. Thus he enters into a state of sanctity which keeps all that is profane at a distance. Then he is not allowed to eat the game which is regarded as the special food of women.[1016] But contact may be established by other means than the touch. One comes into relations with a thing by merely regarding it: a look is a means of contact. This is why the sight of sacred things is forbidden to the profane in certain cases. A woman should never see the instruments of the cult; the most that is permitted her is to catch a glimpse of them from afar.[1017] It is the same with the totemic paintings executed on the bodies of the officiants in the exceptionally important ceremonies.[1018] The exceptional solemnity of the rites of initiation prevents the women in certain tribes from seeing the place where they were celebrated[1019] or even the neophyte himself.[1020] The sacred character which is imminent in the ceremony as a whole is naturally found in the persons of those who directed it or took some part in it; the result of this is that the novice may not raise his eyes to them, and this interdiction continues even after the rite is accomplished.[1021] A dead man is also removed from view sometimes: his face is covered over in such a way that it cannot be seen.[1022] The word is another way of entering into relations with persons or things. The breath expired establishes a communication; this is a part of us which spreads outwards. Thus it is forbidden to the profane to address the sacred beings or simply to speak in their presence. Just as the neophyte must not regard either the operators or the assistants, so it is forbidden to him to converse with them except by signs; and this interdiction keeps the place to which it has been raised, by means of a special rite.[1023] In a general way, there are, among the Arunta, moments in the course of the great ceremonies when silence is obligatory.[1024] As soon as the churinga are exposed, every one keeps still, or if someone talks, he does so in a low voice or with his lips only.[1025] Besides the sacred things, there are words and sounds which have the same character; they should not pass the lips of the profane or enter their ears. There are ritual songs which women must not hear under pain of death.[1026] They may hear the noise of the bull-roarers, but only from a distance. Every proper name is considered an essential element of the person who bears it; being closely associated in the mind to the idea of this person, it participates in the sentiments which this latter inspires. So if the one is sacred, the other is. Therefore, it may not be pronounced in the course of the profane life. Among the Warramunga there is one totem which is particularly venerated, this is the snake called Wollunqua; its name is taboo.[1027] It is the same with Baiame, Daramulun and Bunjil; the esoteric form of their name must not be revealed to the uninitiate.[1028] During mourning, the name of the dead man must not be mentioned, at least by his parents, except when there is an absolute necessity, and even in this case it must be whispered.[1029] This interdiction is frequently perpetual for the widow and certain relatives.[1030] Among certain peoples, this even extends beyond the family; all the individuals whose name is the same as that of the dead man must change theirs temporarily.[1031] But there is more than this: the relatives and intimate friends sometimes abstain from certain words in the usual language, undoubtedly because they were employed by the dead man; these gaps are filled in by means of periphrases or words taken from some foreign dialects.[1032] In addition to their public and everyday names all men have another which is kept a secret: the women and children do not know it; it is never used in the ordinary life. This is because it has a religious character.[1033] There are even ceremonies during which it is necessary to speak a special language which must not be used for profane purposes. It is the beginning of a sacred language.[1034] Not only are the sacred beings separated from the profane, but also nothing which either directly or indirectly concerns the profane life should be confused with the religious life. Complete nudity is frequently demanded of the native as a prerequisite to being admitted to participation in the rites;[1035] he is required to strip himself of all his habitual ornaments, even those to which he is the most attached, and from which he separates himself the least willingly because of the protecting virtues he attributes to them.[1036] If he is obliged to decorate himself to play his part in the ritual, this decoration has to be made specially for the occasion; it is a ceremonial costume, a gala dress.[1037] As these ornaments are sacred, owing to the use made of them, he is forbidden to use them in profane affairs; when the ceremony is finished, they are buried or burnt;[1038] the men must even wash themselves in such a way as to carry away with them no trace of the decorations with which they were adorned.[1039] In general, all acts characteristic of the ordinary life are forbidden while those of the religious life are taking place. The act of eating is, of itself, profane; for it takes place every day, it satisfies essentially utilitarian and material needs and it is a part of our ordinary existence.[1040] This is why it is prohibited in religious times. When one totemic group has loaned its churinga to a foreign clan, it is an exceptionally solemn moment when they are brought back and put into the ertnatulunga; all those who take part in the ceremony must fast as long as it lasts, and it lasts a long time.[1041] The same rule is observed during the rites,[1042] of which we shall speak in the next chapter, as well as at certain moments of the initiation.[1043] For this same reason, all temporal occupations are suspended while the great religious solemnities are taking place. According to a remark of Spencer and Gillen,[1044] which we have already had occasion to cite, the life of the Australian is divided into two very distinct parts: the one is devoted to hunting, fishing and warfare; the other is consecrated to the cult, and these two forms of activity mutually exclude and repel one another. It is on this principle that the universal institution of religious days of rest reposes. The distinctive character of the feast-days in all known religions is the cessation of work and the suspension of public and private life, in so far as it does not have a religious objective. This repose is not merely a sort of temporary relaxation which men have given themselves in order to give themselves up more freely to the sentiments of joy ordinarily awakened by the feast-days; for they are sad feasts, consecrated to mourning and repentance, and during which this cessation is no less obligatory. This is because work is an eminent form of profane activity: it has no other apparent end than to provide for the temporal necessities of life; it puts us in relations with ordinary things only. On feast days, on the contrary, the religious life attains an exceptional degree of intensity. So the contrast between the two forms of existence is especially marked at this moment; consequently, they cannot remain near to each other. A man cannot approach his god intimately while he still bears on him marks of his profane life; inversely, he cannot return to his usual occupations when a rite has just sanctified him. So the ritual day of rest is only one particular case of the general incompatibility separating the sacred from the profane; it is the result of an interdiction.
It would be impossible to enumerate here all the different interdictions which have been observed, even in the Australian religions alone. Like the notion of sacredness upon which it rests, the system of interdicts extends into the most diverse relations; it is even used deliberately for utilitarian ends.[1045] But howsoever complex it may be, it finally rests upon two fundamental interdictions, which summarize it and dominate it.
In the first place, the religious life and the profane life cannot coexist in the same place. If the former is to develop, a special spot must be placed at its disposition, from which the second is excluded. Hence comes the founding of temples and sanctuaries: these are the spots awarded to sacred beings and things and serve them as residences, for they cannot establish themselves in any place except on the condition of entirely appropriating to themselves all within a certain distance. Such arrangements are so indispensable to all religious life that even the most inferior religions cannot do without them. The ertnatulunga, the spot where the churinga are deposited, is a veritable sanctuary. So the uninitiated are not allowed to approach it. It is even forbidden to carry on any profane occupation whatsoever there. As we shall presently see, there are other holy places where important ceremonies are celebrated.[1046] Likewise, the religious life and the profane life cannot coexist in the same unit of time. It is necessary to assign determined days or periods to the first, from which all profane occupations are excluded. Thus feast days are born. There is no religion, and, consequently, no society which has not known and practised this division of time into two distinct parts, alternating with one another according to a law varying with the peoples and the civilizations; as we have already pointed out, it was probably the necessity of this alternation which led men to introduce into the continuity and homogeneity of duration, certain distinctions and differentiations which it does not naturally have.[1047] Of course, it is almost impossible that the religious life should ever succeed in concentrating itself hermetically in the places and times which are thus attributed to it; it is inevitable that a little of it should filter out. There are always some sacred things outside the sanctuaries; there are some rites that can be celebrated on work-days. But these are sacred things of the second rank and rites of a lesser importance. Concentration remains the dominating characteristic of this organization. Generally this concentration is complete for all that concerns the public cult, which cannot be celebrated except in common. The individual, private cult is the only one which comes very near to the temporal life. Thus the contrast between these two successive phases of human life attains its maximum of intensity in the inferior societies; for it is there that the individual cult is the most rudimentary.[1048] II Up to the present, the negative cult has been presented to us only as a system of abstentions. So it seems to serve only to inhibit activity, and not to stimulate it or to modify it. And yet, as an unexpected reaction to this inhibitive effect, it is found to exercise a positive action of the highest importance over the religious and moral nature of the individual.
In fact, owing to the barrier which separates the sacred from the profane, a man cannot enter into intimate relations with sacred things except after ridding himself of all that is profane in him. He cannot lead a religious life of even a slight intensity unless he commences by withdrawing more or less completely from the temporal life. So the negative cult is in one sense a means in view of an end: it is a condition of access to the positive cult. It does not confine itself to protecting sacred beings from vulgar contact; it acts upon the worshipper himself and modifies his condition positively. The man who has submitted himself to its prescribed interdictions is not the same afterwards as he was before. Before, he was an ordinary being who, for this reason, had to keep at a distance from the religious forces. Afterwards, he is on a more equal footing with them; he has approached the sacred by the very act of leaving the profane; he has purified and sanctified himself by the very act of detaching himself from the base and trivial matters that debased his nature. So the negative rites confer efficient powers just as well as the positive ones; the first, like the second, can serve to elevate the religious tone of the individual. According to a very true remark which has been made, no one can engage in a religious ceremony of any importance without first submitting himself to a sort of preliminary initiation which introduces him progressively into the sacred world.[1049] Unctions, lustrations, benedictions or any essentially positive operation may be used for this purpose; but the same result may be attained by means of fasts and vigils or retreat and silence, that is to say, by ritual abstinences, which are nothing more than certain interdictions put into practice.
When there are only particular and isolated negative rites, their positive action is generally too slight to be easily perceptible. But there are circumstances when a whole system of interdictions is concentrated on one man; in these cases, their effects accumulate, and thus become more manifest. This takes place in Australia at the time of the initiation. The neophyte is submitted to a great variety of negative rites. He must withdraw from the society in which his existence has been passed up till then, and from almost all human society. Not only is it forbidden for him to see women and uninitiated persons,[1050] but he also goes to live in the brush, far from his fellows, under the direction of some old men who serve him as godfathers.[1051] So very true is it that the forest is considered his natural environment, that in a certain number of tribes, the word with which the initiation is designated signifies _that which is from the forest_.[1052] For this same reason, he is frequently decorated with leaves during the ceremonies at which he assists.[1053] In this way he passes long months,[1054] interspersed from time to time with rites in which he must take a part. This time is a period of all sorts of abstinences for him. A multitude of foods are forbidden him; he is allowed only that quantity of food which is absolutely indispensable for the maintenance of life;[1055] he is even sometimes bound to a rigorous fast,[1056] or must eat impure foods.[1057] When he eats, he must not touch the food with his hands; his godfathers put it into his mouth for him.[1058] In some cases, he must go to beg his food.[1059] Likewise, he sleeps only as much as is indispensable.[1060] He must abstain from talking, to the extent of not uttering a word; it is by signs that he makes known his needs.[1061] He must not wash;[1062] sometimes he must not move. He remains stretched out upon the earth, immobile[1063] and without clothing of any sort.[1064] Now the result of the numerous interdictions is to bring about a radical change of condition in the initiate. Before the initiation, he lived with the women; he was excluded from the cult. After it, he is admitted to the society of men; he takes part in the rites, and has acquired a sacred character. The metamorphosis is so complete that it is sometimes represented as a second birth. They imagine that the profane person, who was the young man up till then, has died, that he has been killed and carried away by the god of the initiation, Bunjil, Baiame or Daramulun, and that quite another individual has taken the place of the one that no longer is.[1065] So here we find the very heart of the positive effects of which negative rites are capable. Of course we do not mean to say that these latter produced this great transformation all by themselves; but they certainly contributed to it, and largely.
In the light of these facts, we are able to understand what asceticism is, what place it occupies in the religious life and whence come the virtues which have generally been attributed to it. In fact, there is no interdict, the observance of which does not have an ascetic character to a certain degree. Abstaining from something which may be useful or from a form of activity which, since it is usual, should answer to some human need, is, of necessity, imposing constraints and renunciations. So in order to have real asceticism, it is sufficient for these practices to develop in such a way as to become the basis of a veritable scheme of life. Normally, the negative cult serves only as an introduction and preparation for the positive cult. But it sometimes happens that it frees itself from this subordination and passes to the first place, and that the system of interdicts swells and exaggerates itself to the point of usurping the entire existence. Thus a systematic asceticism is born which is consequently nothing more than a hypertrophy of the negative cult. The special virtues which it is believed to confer are only an amplified form of those conferred, to a lesser degree, by the practice of any interdiction. They have the same origin; for they both rest on the principle that a man sanctifies himself only by efforts made to separate himself from the profane. The pure ascetic is a man who raises himself above men and acquires a special sanctity by fasts and vigils, by retreat and silence, or in a word, by privations, rather than by acts of positive piety (offerings, sacrifices, prayers, etc.). History shows to what a high religious prestige one may attain by this method: the Buddhist saint is essentially an ascetic, and he is equal or superior to the gods.
It follows that asceticism is not a rare, exceptional and nearly abnormal fruit of the religious life, as some have supposed it to be; on the contrary, it is one of its essential elements. Every religion contains it, at least in germ, for there are none in which a system of interdicts is not found. Their only difference in this regard which there may be between cults is that this germ is more or less developed in different ones. It should also be added that there probably is not a single one in which this development does not take, at least temporarily, the characteristic traits of real asceticism. This is what generally takes place at certain critical periods when, for a relatively short time, it is necessary to bring about a grave change of condition in a subject. Then, in order to introduce him more rapidly into the circle of sacred things with which he must be put in contact, he is separated violently from the profane world; but this does not come without many abstinences and an exceptional recrudescence of the system of interdicts. Now this is just what happens in Australia at the moment of initiation. In order to transform youths into men, it is necessary to make them live the life of a veritable ascetic. Mrs. Parker very justly calls them the monks of Baiame.[1066] But abstinences and privations do not come without suffering. We hold to the profane world by all the fibres of our flesh; our senses attach us to it; our life depends upon it. It is not merely the natural theatre of our activity; it penetrates us from every side; it is a part of ourselves. So we cannot detach ourselves from it without doing violence to our nature and without painfully wounding our instincts. In other words, the negative cult cannot develop without causing suffering. Pain is one of its necessary conditions. Some have been led to think of it as constituting a sort of rite in itself; they have seen in it a state of grace which is to be sought and aroused, even artificially, because of the powers and privileges which it confers in the same way as these systems of interdicts, of which it is the natural accompaniment. So far as we know, Preuss is the first who has realized the religious rôle[1067] which is attributed to suffering in the inferior societies. He cites the case of the Arapahs who inflict veritable torments upon themselves in order to become immune from the dangers of battle; of the Big Belly Indians who submit to actual tortures on the eve of military expeditions; of the Hupa who swim in icy rivers and then remain stretched out on the bank as long as possible, in order to assure themselves of success in their enterprises; of the Karaya who from time to time draw blood from their arms and legs by means of scratches made out of the teeth of fish, in order to strengthen their muscles; of the men of Dallmannhafen (Emperor William's Land in New Guinea) who combat the sterility of their women by making bloody incisions in the upper part of their thighs.[1068] But similar facts may be found without leaving Australia, especially in the course of the initiation ceremonies. Many of the rites practised on this occasion consist in systematically inflicting certain pains on the neophyte in order to modify his condition and to make him acquire the qualities characteristic of a man. Thus, among the Larakia, while the young men are in retreat in the forest, their godfathers and guardians give them violent blows at any instant, without warning and without cause.[1069] Among the Urabunna, at a certain time, the novice is stretched out on the ground, his face against the earth. All the men present beat him rudely; then they make four or eight gashes on his back, arranged on each side of the dorsal spine and one on the meridial line of the nape of his neck.[1070] Among the Arunta, the first rite of the initiation consists in tossing the subject in a blanket; the men throw him into the air and catch him when he comes down, to throw him up again.[1071] In the same tribe, at the close of this long series of ceremonies, the young man lies down on a bed of leaves under which they have placed live coals; he remains there, immobile in the midst of the heat and suffocating smoke.[1072] A similar rite is observed among the Urabunna; but in addition, while the patient is in this painful situation, they beat him on the back.[1073] In a general way, all the exercises to which he is submitted have this same character to such an extent that when he is allowed to re-enter the ordinary life, he has a pitiful aspect and appears half stupefied.[1074] It is true that all these practices are frequently represented as ordeals destined to prove the value of the neophyte and to show whether he is worthy of being admitted into the religious society or not.[1075] But in reality, the probational function of the rite is only another aspect of its efficacy. For the fact that it has been undergone is proved by its producing its effect, that is to say, by its conferring the qualities which are the original reason for its existence.
In other cases, these ritual cruelties are executed, not on the organism as a whole, but on a particular organ or tissue, whose vitality it is their object to stimulate. Thus, among the Arunta, the Warramunga and many other tribes,[1076] at a certain moment in the initiation, certain persons are charged with biting the novice severely in the scalp. This operation is so painful that the patient can hardly support it without uttering cries. Its object is to make the hair grow.[1077] The same treatment is applied to make the beard grow. The rite of pulling out hairs, which Howitt mentions in other tribes, seems to have the same reason for existence.[1078] According to Eylmann, the men and women of the Arunta and the Kaitish make small wounds on their arms with sticks red with fire, in order to become skilful in making fire or to acquire the strength necessary for carrying heavy loads of wood.[1079] According to this same observer, the Warramunga girls amputate the second and third joints of the index finger on one hand, thinking that the finger thus becomes better fitted for finding yams.[1080] It is not impossible that the extraction of teeth was sometimes destined to produce effects of this sort. In any case, it is certain that the cruel rites of circumcision and subincision have the object of conferring particular powers on the genital organs. In fact, the young man is not allowed to marry until after he has undergone them; so he owes them special virtues. What makes this initiation _sui generis_ indispensable is that in all inferior societies, the union of the sexes is marked with a religious character. It is believed to put redoubtable forces into play which a man cannot approach without danger, until after he has acquired the necessary immunity, by ritual processes:[1081] for this, a whole series of positive and negative practices is used, of which circumcision and subincision are the forerunners. By painfully mutilating an organ, a sacred character is given to it, since by that act, it is put into shape for resisting the equally sacred forces which it could not meet otherwise.
At the beginning of this work, we said that all the essential elements of religious thought and life ought to be found, at least in germ, in the most primitive religions: the preceding facts confirm this assertion. If there is any one belief which is believed to be peculiar to the most recent and idealistic religions, it is the one attributing a sanctifying power to sorrow. Now this same belief is at the basis of the rites which have just been observed. Of course, it is understood differently at the different moments of history when it is studied. For the Christian, it acts especially upon the soul: it purges it, ennobles it, spiritualizes it. For the Australian, it is the body over which it is efficient: it increases its vital energies; it makes its beard and hair grow; it toughens its members. But in both cases the principle is the same. In both it is admitted that suffering creates exceptional strength. And this belief is not without foundation. In fact, it is by the way in which he braves suffering that the greatness of a man is best manifested. He never rises above himself with more brilliancy than when he subdues his own nature to the point of making it follow a way contrary to the one it would spontaneously take. By this, he distinguishes himself from all the other creatures who follow blindly wherever pleasure calls them; by this, he makes a place apart for himself in the world. Suffering is the sign that certain of the bonds attaching him to his profane environment are broken; so it testifies that he is partially freed from this environment, and, consequently, it is justly considered the instrument of deliverance. So he who is thus delivered is not the victim of a pure illusion when he believes himself invested with a sort of mastery over things: he really has raised himself above them, by the very act of renouncing them; he is stronger than nature, because he makes it subside.
Moreover, it is by no means true that this virtue has only an æsthetic value: the whole religious life supposes it. Sacrifices and privations do not come without privations which cost the worshipper dear. Even if the rites do not demand material gifts from him, they require his time and his strength. In order to serve his gods, he must forget himself; to make for them a fitting place in his own life, he must sacrifice his profane interests. The positive cult is possible only when a man is trained to renouncement, to abnegation, to detachment from self, and consequently to suffering. It is necessary that he have no dread of them: he cannot even fulfil his duties joyfully unless he loves them to some extent. But for that, it is necessary that he train himself, and it is to this that the ascetic practices tend. So the suffering which they impose is not arbitrary and sterile cruelty; it is a necessary school, where men form and temper themselves, and acquire the qualities of disinterestedness and endurance without which there would be no religion. If this result is to be obtained, it is even a good thing that the ascetic ideal be incarnated eminently in certain persons, whose speciality, so to speak, it is to represent, almost with excess, this aspect of the ritual life; for they are like so many living models, inciting to effort. Such is the historic rôle of the great ascetics. When their deeds and acts are analysed in detail, one asks himself what